


Red and His Weird Habits

by icrave



Category: Hermitcraft (Minecraft)
Genre: Crying, Hurt/Comfort, My heart melted, Other, Stimming, The Red Son Never Sleeps Au, This is, lmao "red jumbo" sounds incredibly stupid but that's his name!, meltdowns, so cute
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-05
Updated: 2019-07-05
Packaged: 2020-06-09 23:57:55
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,733
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19486660
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/icrave/pseuds/icrave
Summary: A Oneshot containing Quiet Days, New Things, Loud Things, And Stimming.Otherwise known as "Local Six Year old Learns To Be Ok With His Neuroatypical Habits"





	Red and His Weird Habits

**Author's Note:**

> (For those who don't know, this is a fic for the Red Son Never Sleeps AU, Which is an au of a fit called The Red Sun Never Sets, it's way happier and less emotionally heartbreaking than TRSNS but you can't have a hurt/comfort fic with no hurt so)

It was quiet.  
Red always liked the quiet days.  
Sure, He liked the excitement of his relatively new life, the colors, the sounds, it was new! It was different! It was a far cry from his other home, the barren wasteland of never-ending sun and red. So much red. But excitement, as different as it is, can be tiring sometimes. 

“This, though,” Red thought to himself, burying his face into the soft, grey blanket. “I’ll never get tired of this.” It was a new thing Red had found, one of many since going through that portal. Specific feelings and textures would call out to him, and he just adored indulging in all of them.  
Soft, so far, was his favorite, always comforting and great for mashing your face into whenever the bad tantrums hit. Second to that was grainy, which was amazing on hands, less so in the mouth. On the opposite side, the worst had to be roughness, it reminded him too much of The Other Place to really get into it, and mushy things (especially WET mushy things) just felt wrong. Like he wasn’t EVER suppose to touch it, like it was obscene. Luckily, he had an amazing supply of Soft and Grainy, the first coming in the form of the countless blankets and sweaters he had nabbed from Grian, and the latter taking the shape of redstone.

Oh STARS he loved redstone. It’s his namesake, after all, with those fine, almost silk-like grains he loved stroking and putting his fingers through, and the electric jolt he’d feel when he was near a powersource while doing that? Amazing.  
Redstone was a happy thing.  
Usually something Da-Mumbo did with Red. This wasn’t one of those things though. It couldn’t be, unfortunately. 

Red sighed, a bag of redstone laying next to him. The contents on his hands, bing tossed about. He was curled up in a ball under about,,,,3 layers of soft blankets; on the floor of one of Mumbo’s abandoned houses he forgot about. With rain pattering against the window softly, Red, even though he loved doing these things, knew this one could never be seen. It wasn’t obscene, wasn’t illegal, It just felt wrong to have someone witness this. This was just,,,, too personal. And too weird. Too different. He’d never seen any other hermit do this, ever. It was just him. Him and his weird habits. 

He knew how other people reacted to weird habits. He didn’t wanna be alone again. 

He tried not to think about it too much as he sat on the carpet floor, the only decoration in the abandoned room. The redstone in his hand glowed and sparked, and he began to almost forget those bad thoughts. He nestled further into the blankets, a dazed look on his face as he felt his cheeks began to glow -literally- with red light. The light then turned into happy little sparks of electricity that bounced about- giving of a firework effect in the room. The rain against the window provided the perfect background noise for this. Red was, in a lack of a better term, completely content.  
He was so content he didn’t even hear the footsteps coming toward him, those same footsteps that stopped at the doorway, or the slight gasp by the person who caused them. 

Then the person spoke, and it all went straight to hell. 

Red gasped- no, shrieked- and the mini firework show he was causing flashed blindingly for a second before immediately stopping. Red made a squeaking/squealing noise before he immediately hit the deck, causing redstone to fly everywhere. His flight, fight or freeze response stumbling over each other, which caused him to perform some sort of twisted combination of all of them. His freckles no longer glowed, but his face was still hot. Red didn’t now if he was crying because of the intruder or because of the redstone in his eyes. 

He recognized that voice though. It was Mumbo. Mumbo was nice, he’s always been nice. But that didn’t matter. It didn’t MATTER how nice Mumbo was, he wouldn’t understand what Red was doing. And adults got scary when they didn’t understand something. Adults ignored, Adults screamed. Adults left. 

Sometimes, they’d leave forever. And he’d just be stuck in the red world again.  
Just Him and his weird habits.

Red didn’t wanna be left behind again. He didn’t wanna leave the colors, the sounds, the new things, the differences. So he stayed there, hot tears sliding down his cheeks and onto the redstone covered floor, causing it to sizzle. Red felt a knot form in his throat, nearly suffocating him. He felt hot shame and rage for his situation, rage at how it always had to be like this and why couldn’t they just let him dO THIS WHY DID HE HAVE TO KEEP HIDINGALLTHETIME-

He left out an angry yelp when he felt Mumbo touch his shoulder. Red spun sideways, looking at him with wild, furious eyes. His freckles were glowing again, but they were hot. Red hot. They crackled dangerously, alerting Mumbo to stay away. Red’s hair stood on end, his throat clammed up with emotion. 

Mumbo looked scared and worried. Scared, worried, and confused. Red didn’t care though, trying to get as far away from Mumbo as possible. He was unsuccessful, instead getting tangled in the countless soft sheets. This new lack of mobility only freaked him out more, turning his quiet sobs to shrieks and screams until he felt like he couldn’t breathe anymore. He was trapped. 

He could see through blurry eyes that Mumbo had knelt down and reached over to him, trying to free him from his blanket prison. Red only began grew more frantic, his attempt to keep himself from crying backfiring spectacular and he could feel his throat clenching as he began to sob even harder, wheezing and gasping to make up for the lost air. Mumbo’s eyes widened, and he tried to softly coax him out. It failed. Eventually though, Red tired out enough so that Mumbo could pull him out, sitting Red on his lamp. Red didn’t say anything, really too tired to do anything but cry softly.

Mumbo was too busy checking Red for wounds. With that intense sparkshow he’d witnessed before speaking, Red must’ve have gotten into Mumbo’s rocket stash again, and six year old plus firework equals a bad equation that shouldn’t be solved. Though, finding nothing inherently wrong with Red, he spoke again, softer this time.

“Are you doing alright?” Red thought it was a dumb question, and Mumbo probably thought so too; but never the less, he shook his head. His brain hurt terribly, and unfortunate side effect to these meltdowns, and he was still wheezing and gasping for air. 

“Hey, hey, hey,” Mumbo began, placing his hand on Red’s back, trying to soothe him. “Breathe, breathe.” Red desperately tried following his advice, but he couldn’t stop crying. Mumbo needed to figure out what was wrong- and fast.

“Was it a redstone accident?” Mumbo must be referring to the light show that happened. Red didn’t answer that, instead burrowing his face into Mumbo’s suit. He really didn’t wanna talk right now, maybe he could play the nonverbal game long enough- 

“I’m really sorry for startling you.” 

Red looked up at that. Mumbo had a soft smile on his face. 

“You seemed to be having fun.” 

“I was.” 

Red surprised himself by talking, his voice hoarse and raspy. Mumbo seemed surprised too, letting out a little hum in response, his hand moving to pat Red’s head. “Sorry for ruining that- what were you doing anyway?” Red froze at Mumbo’s worried tone. “Looked like a mini firework show- and that spark!” Red looked up. He was still crying slightly, the words he wanted to say caught in his throat, so he just said what he normally said.

“I don’t know.”  
It was a phrase he said a lot. Mumbo raised an eyebrow. “You don’t?” Red nodded, still crying slightly.

“You sure?”  
“Well- I mean- I just was, uh.” Red stumbled. And the more he stumbled, the more embarrassed he felt. It wasn’t long before he felt that all-to-familiar knot in his throat. Luckily, Mumbo changed the subject, putting Red down and walking over to the blankets.

“These blankets sure are soft, huh?” He said, picking them up, trying to shake the redstone off. Red nodded, watching Mumbo intently. He cringed as the Redstone fell onto the floor, and he watched for his reaction. He, however, either didn’t notice or just didn’t care, and walked over to Red with them in hand. “Where’d you even get these?” He pondered, sitting back down with Red. “I certainly haven't seen these before.” 

Red faintly smiled, a familiar mischievous smirk winning over his face. “Stole ‘em.” he giggled. Mumbo feigned surprise.  
“From who?”  
“Grian.”  
“Ah. May I ask why?” He said tentatively. Red sniffled, mashing his face into the soft fabric, ignoring the leftover bits of redstone dust that still stubbornly clung to it.

“It’s...soft.” He finally answered, pulling his face out as he instead opted to simply stroke the blanket instead. “It’s very soft.” Mumbo nodded, “You like soft things?” “Well, yeah.” Red responded, crawling into Mumbo’s lap. “Well, than I-”  
“It’s soft and it makes me happy.” Red blurted out, interrupting Mumbo who blinked in response, looking down at Red.

“Well, then I should definitely get more soft things.” Mumbo Chortled. 

Red was surprised. This was the best this situation had ever gone. Then again, he only had to do it twice before, with his, other parents. They didn’t handle it that well. 

‘Well,’ Red thought to himself, mashing his face into Mumbo’s suit, ‘Mumbo isn’t like my other parent’s.’ 

Mumbo interrupted Red’s thoughts.  
“So, now that we’ve established that you like soft things, why don’t we pay Grian a visit tomorrow and get more soft things through, non-illegal means, huh?” He suggested, looking down at Red. Red nodded sleepy, this whole experience was entirely tiring and he desperately wanted to sleep. 

“My you’ve worked yourself out huh?” Mumbo laughed, and Red could only bring himself to yawn. “Well, then,” Mumbo stated, Picking Red up and exiting the building, “Let’s get you to bed!”

And as Red laid down, snuggling the covers, it was quiet again. 

Yes, it was quiet.  
Red really liked the quiet nights.

**Author's Note:**

> First Fic Let's Go!!!


End file.
